I’m spending a year dead for tax reasons – Douglas Adams

With the self-assessment tax deadline looming and with most of you still suffering from the January blues, I thought you could all do with a laugh courtesy of HMRC. I’m not having a dig at them but I want to share with you some of the excuses they have received from the public who have not paid their taxes.

We have the self-employed builder whose pet goldfish died, the financial services company who said their company doesn’t do much and the self-employed trader who claimed his wife won’t give him his post. The fact that they were cheeky enough to use these excuses is incredible but unfortunately for them they were given a £100 penalty by HMRC so I wonder if they will dare again.

You see we all have a duty to pay what we owe – we can’t get away from it so rather than dig a very big hole do the sensible thing and cough up. Don’t get me wrong though, there are times I’m sure where HMRC will be lenient but don’t take it to a level where you end up with egg on your face because you will lose and end up paying more than you originally had to.

So to the man who said he was cruising around the world in his yacht and only picking up post when he was on dry land, that £100 penalty will still be waiting for you when you get back!

If you like the way we think – you will like the way we work.

AIMS Accountants for Business are the largest independent association of professionally qualified accountants in the UK specialising in accountancy for small, local and independent businesses. AIMS are no ordinary accountants and we are more than just number crunchers!